The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) yesterday said it plans to sponsor its first Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC), which will support a relatively new cyber security center of excellence that NIST and partners in state and local governments established last year to help find cyber security solutions that meet the needs of businesses.
Last week NIST, along with the State of Maryland and Montgomery County, Md., announced its first industry partners in the National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (Defense Daily, April 16).
FFRDCs are independent non-profit organizations set up to operate in the public interest to leverage and assemble resources and engineering talent from both the public and private sectors.
“The FFRDC model is the most effective way the center can work with private companies to accelerate industry’s adoption of integrated tools and technologies to protect information technology assets,” Patrick Gallagher, director of NIST, said in a statement.
Federal staff will provide the overall management of the center of excellence and the FFRDC will provide various types of support to its mission, including research and development, engineering and technical support to devise, test and demonstrate integrated technical solutions to difficult cyber security challenges, and program and project management.
NIST announced its plans for the FFRDC in yesterday’s Federal Register and plans to seek proposals in the fall for management of the FFRDC, the first solely dedicated to securing the nation’s information systems.